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Thursday, January 2, 2014

Dividend Update - December 2013

What can I say? December has come and gone and with it we close the books on 2013. It's been a great year as far as growth of my FI Portfolio, and most importantly the dividends I received and can expect to receive in 2014. These dividend updates reflect all dividends that I receive through my investing pursuits and I hope can help inspire you to take control of your own finances and investing to build a passive income stream. What you use that stream for is up to you, whether it's to fund early retirement, just provide some FI/FU money, or even to provide for an annual vacation; the key is that it can provide options and opens up all sorts of possibilities. Since most of my ownership stakes pay on the March, June, September, December schedule I get great results when each quarter closes. You can check my dividend income or progress page to see what dedication to an investment plan can give you. I was able to set a personal best in dividends received during December which is great motivation and helps to keep me on track.

I received a total of $535.16 in dividends in my FI portfolio in December and a total of $2,546.79 for the full year. The Roth IRA continues to see very little growth as I can't make new contributions due to being above the income threshold but I'm not too worried about that. The main thing is to make sure taxable account continues to increase month after month. In my Roth IRA I received a total of $35.02 in dividends raising the total for 2013 to $205.40.

For my FI portfolio, December saw a 18% increase over September 2013 and 70% increase over December 2012. The growth for the Roth IRA was a mixed bag as it was a 28% decrease from September 2013 but a 21% increase from December 2012. The decrease was due to selling out of my position in Tower Group in order to both just cut my losses and raise funds for the call option on Bank of America that should get executed in January. I'm also sitting on about $1k cash in the account to put to work when a good opportunity comes along.

My FI portfolio's forward 12-month dividends increased to $3,597.64 which is awesome and just over double from the end of 2012. Assuming no dividend increases and no further investments I can expect to receive almost $300 per month in dividends. That's a solid chunk of money that I didn't have to work for. Another great thing is that with the purchases in late November and early December, as well as some dividend increases those forward dividends pushed me past my goal of $3,500 in forward dividends by the end of the year. I barely hit this goal, surpassing by just 2.8%, but a win is a win and I have to keep remembering I took out over $30k in capital earlier this year to help fund the down-payment on our house. My Roth IRA's forward 12-month dividends are at $201.76 and will only make baby steps going forward.

All in all it was a great year with lots of growth and changes. I can't wait to get the regular monthly update posts written up as well as the year in review post for my goals and set some new goals.

I wanted to add one more chart (yep, I'm a sucker for visual aids) to help show the growth of my dividends received. It shows the month by month comparison for each year since I started down the dividend growth path. The trend is definitely in the right direction.

I wish I could have a repeat but that won't be coming unless I get a huge pay raise. We can dream can't we? It was a great year and I'm hoping for even better things in 2014. With fairly conservative 5% DG and assuming no reinvestment and no purchases except for the put option on O, I should get up to somewhere around $3,800 for 2014. So I'm happy about that because there will be more capital invested this year.

$300 per month with just quarterly checkups on the holdings? That's fine by me. Now to get another zero at the end. I've looked at some properties and have some lined up that I'm serious about purchasing. Just hope they're still on the market when I get a chance to be home and make a walk-through. Best of luck in 2014!

It's a shame about the IRA because I'd love to contribute to the Roth but it just doesn't really make any sense. If I didn't have some rollover IRA then I'd do the conversion but I know our tax rate won't stay at the 28% level so there will be better times to convert in the future. Best wishes for 2014!

I wish I was averaging that but I'll take $500+ once a quarter. The big difference as of now for 2014 dividends vs 2013 dividends is that I'l be receiving a lot more on the non March, June, September, December schedules. It wasn't really planned that way but it worked out pretty nicely.

772 EUR is still a solid total. I think between dividend increases and more investment you should be able to get there. Assuming 5% DG average and a 3% starting yield you'd need to contribute $6300. I know as a European investor the yields are typically higher so I think you'll be able to get there.

I don't care if you're coming off a fairly low base PIP....you are making great strides. I also am juggling Roth and taxable investments. I consider it a tax diversification strategy. Even if someone doesn't retire early.....who know's when the politicians will end the Roth IRA tax benefits. I have been thrilled with my DRIP investments over the last 5 years. The markets got elevated enough that I started taking most of the dividends as checks though, about a year ago.-Bryan-Bryan

It wasn't the smallest of bases, but it still wasn't a huge level either. I'm still happy with the progress and I'm looking forward to 2014. Should bring a lot of changes and hopefully some solid progress. The rentals I'm looking at can cash flow between $200-300 per month so I'm anxious to get one of those purchased and rented out. I'm using my 401k as my tax hedge and hopefully just a safety net/bonus/legacy. The Roth is a great thing if you can contribute, of course that's assuming the current version of the Roth stays in place. Who knows what those crazy politicians will think up next.

I received £4031 ($6,450) in dividends in 2013, and if the companies I own increase their dividends by an average of 4% in 2014, then I will exceed £5,000 ($8,000). The increase being much higher than the 4% is due to the re-investment of 2013 dividends, and I sold a lower paying company and invested in a higher paying company towards the end of 2014.

I believe that I have now reached the point where the dividend snowball is starting to gather momentum, and that my annual increase in dividends will start to be several hundred pounds each year.

One other milestone I should reach next year is my forecast of dividends in August 2014 is over £1,000 ($1,600), the first time I have achieved this in a single month.

I hope your dividend snowball also accumulates nicely in 2014 and beyond.

Almost $6,500 is awesome. I'd be around 1/3 of the way towards FI at that point. The dividend snowball is great as you reach the point where you are making 1/4 position, the half position, then full position purchases with just dividends alone.

That's amazing that you're forecasting to receive $1,600 in August. Great work and great progress. You present and future self should be thanking the younger you.

The March, June, September, December schedule is loaded with lots of the high quality dividend payers. I'm still working on getting the income spread out a bit more throughout the months, but the main focus is to invest in quality companies at fair to value prices.

2013 was great for so many of us and it seemed like all the time I was seeing a new blog pop up about someone starting their journey. 2014 should really start to show the fruits of our collective labors as the DG continues to be off larger bases. Best wishes for 2014! It should be a great year!

That growth was great and assuming conservative estimates for 2014 and no investment I should see somewhere around a 48% increase for 2014 vs 2013. The investments will be a bit lower but I'm looking at a rental property purchase that can cash flow much better than the DG stocks. I still like DG as a strategy to receive reliable and growing income but there's nothing wrong with diversifying the income sources further.

That's awesome that you'll be around the $3.5k level with the US portfolio, especially with your sizeable AUS portfolio. You sure are raking in the dividends over there. $4k would be nice. I'm hoping to push my up to around the $4.6-8k mark and add in some rental property income as well. 2014 should be a fun year.

Nice work on your jump in Dividend pay outs.I’m a newbie to dividend investing (about 3 years) and have tried a couple of different ways to track my portfolio (seeking alpha, CNN money, Yahoo finance, etc.). I am currently using a Google Spreadsheet with different codes I have acquired from looking at others. Still not too happy with it. Do you have any suggestions for a great dividend portfolio tracker? Last Year made $1300This year, I'm aiming for $2000

That'll be a nice bump to go from $1300 to $2000. About a 50% increase. And I'm glad you're going for DGI. I think for the average Joe investor DGI is one of the most basic, easy to understand concepts for investing. Once you can switch your mindset to focus on the dividends rather than the stock prices it's much easier to stay invested in declining markets. Too often the average investor gets scared out of the markets at the wrong time and then get back in at the wrong time. That's not a good formula for successful investing.

I've only really used the Google Finance tracker but it was a lot of work. You had to go and put every dividend payment in there and I honestly just forgot to keep updating it. I use my own Excel sheet and the Google Spreadsheet on my portfolio page. Whenever I find something else I want to track for my portfolio I just add stuff in. If you want I can send you my Google spreadsheet so you can see what it's like.

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